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<h2>Who are involved?</h2>
			<b>CoRAL</b> is a Master's thesis project conducted by Samaneh Bayat at Computing Science Dept. of the University of Alberta (Canada) under supervision of Professor Eleni 
			Stroulia. Several eager and experienced undergraduate students from universities across Canada have been 
			working on development of the <b>CoRAL reporter</b> in two <a href="http://ucosp.ca/">UCOSP</a> projects
			managed by Professor Eleni Stroulia and Samaneh Bayat. The first team (Fall 2010) 
			includes Chong Su (University of Waterloo), Jia Sun (Simon Fraser University), Keen Sung (University of Alberta), and Ilia Pak (University of British Columbia). 
			The second team (Winter 2011 - just starting) includes ... . 
			
			<br/>
<h2>More about CoRAL and its development</h2>
<b>CoRAL</b> (Collaborative Review Analysis of Literature) consists of two components: <b>CoRAL browser</b> and <b>CoRAL reporter</b>. <b>CoRAL browser</b> is an academic publication 
browser, built upon <a href="http://code.google.com/p/fab4browser/">Fab4browser</a>, that allows users to annotate and discuss academic papers. It was designed 
to facilitate discussion and development of ideas 
and encourage collaboration and sharing of viewpoints between different experts of the scientific community. <b>CoRAL reporter</b> 
is a web tool to visualize these networks, gauging the activity and impact of a paper on <b>CoRAL</b> users, and measuring the usage data of specific users.
The reports contain visualizations from various perspectives that could be used to analyze the popularity of a paper, highlight discussions about the paper, and 
display networks arising from these conversations. Furthermore, visualizations were implemented to measure a user’s activity on <b>CoRAL</b>, papers read, and papers 
annotated.
<br /><br />
UCOSP students (Fall 2010) used a PHP logic tier to interact with the DB2 database, and several JavaScript frameworks to implement the interactive 
visualization widgets. Students were able to independently develop the back-end logic and the separate widgets, and collaboratively piece together their work 
into a single interactive web application. Students simultaneously learnt the practical use of PHP and JavaScript, visualization, and techniques in code 
communication and collaboration.
<br /><br />
The current state of the product is a web tool that allows users to search for papers or other users on <b>CoRAL</b> and view information about the papers or users found. In the 
paper view, users are able to filter comments by the comment authors, and view on a timeline both when the paper was viewed and when comments were made. 
Furthermore, users can view the activity and popularity of users and comments based on comment ratings; user popularity and activity are visualized by their 
color and size on the network view. The person view displays both user activity and comments made on a timeline, and also displays a user’s interactivity 
with other users on a network graph. Furthermore, a summary of the user’s activity regarding papers read and comments made is displayed. The modular widgets 
can be adapted for use in other projects or pages involving <b>CoRAL</b>, or extended to display more complex analyses.
<br /><br />
The reporter does not only show how <b>CoRAL</b> is being used, but in fact the information about papers and users is particularly valuable in realizing how  
scientific social networks are formed and whether certain researchers and ideas 
are influential or controversial. More importantly, it can be used to track the evolution of ideas or pieces of writing as they become more refined and possibly 
eventually publishable. <br />
<br/>
This application is still under development. <br/>
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